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Inshore Fisheries Seminar

White Fish Image28 March 2003

The Partnership wishes to focus more attention on the important issue of fisheries in the Moray Firth. Following previous meetings and consultations with fishing representatives, we started the process with this seminar, providing an opportunity for all interested parties to meet and share ideas. Our aim was to enable a better understanding of the main issues impacting on the fishing industry in the Moray Firth and to identify those which can be addressed through partnership working.

Fifty delegates attended, from all around the Firth. They represented practically all of the relevant interests and organisations including the many fishermens organisations, fish processing and marketing organisations, The Scottish Executive, public bodies, ports, fisheries research and others.

The programme provided up to date information on all aspects of fisheries, from speakers who are experts in their fields:

25 years of fisheries in the Moray Firth

Roddy McColl & Sandy Patience

Fishermens Association Ltd.

Key issues for fisheries in the Moray Firth

Ian Duncan

Scottish Fishermens Federation

Interaction between oil and fish

John Watt

Scottish White Fish Producers Assoc. Ltd.

Shellfish marketing trends and opportunities

Jon Harman

Seafish Industry Authority

Regulating orders

Peter Davidson

Highland Shellfish Management Orgn

Integrating environmental concerns and fisheries management

David Donnan

Scottish Natural Heritage

EU Directives and coastal water quality

Ronald Daalmans

Scottish Environment Protection Agency

A new era in fishing

Tony Hawkins

North Sea Commission Fisheries Partnership

The role of the Moray Firth Partnership & next steps

Chair Mike Comerford

Moray Firth Partnership

Through the presentations and discussions the seminar delegates identified the key issues and suggested ways forward. These are fully documented in the seminar report on our website.

Current Issues


The main recommendations identified the need for:a strategy or vision for inshore fisheries in the Moray Firth, to identify ways of achieving an integrated approach and devolving more responsibilities from the centre to the local level.

  • a system for enabling more integrated and co-ordinated management of inshore fisheries in the Moray Firth, involving all interests
  • greater co-operation in place of conflict. Scientists and fishermen need to work together more and potentially conflicting interests/ issues need to be addressed through an integrated process.

Ways forward


The seminar identified many positive ways forward to enable a more healthy fishing industry in the Firth, with wider benefits to the community. These included:

  • investigating the total economics of inshore fisheries to provide a better understanding of the full picture
  • investigating the potential for sustainable harvesting of new species in the Firth, and their market potential.
  • adding value to the primary product through more, diverse local processing, creative marketing and establishing links to local markets. It was noted that 80% of shellfish landed are exported raw, mostly abroad.
  • investigating new opportunities for improving fish-stocks in the Moray Firth and for utilising new methods for sustainable fishing.
  • enabling better access to accurate and relevant data on the state of the fisheries in the Moray Firth, to provide a realistic picture of the available fish stocks.
  • taking steps to develop a more sustainable fishery in the Moray Firth, based on good information and a better understanding of the causes of current problems.

Role for the MFP


It was felt that the Moray Firth Partnership has an important role to play in co-ordinating and activating some of this work. The benefits from the neutral status of the Partnership were identified. This enables us to bring together the many diverse interest groups and to help them to develop joint actions. Fishermen and their organisations were encouraged to join the Moray Firth Partnership, in order to improve the fisheries input and to guide our work.

Next Steps


Following on from the seminar, the Moray Firth Partnership is now looking at ways of taking forward some of the issues raised. The next steps have been agreed, and include:

  • the production of a special fisheries edition of our newsletter
  • the establishment of a Moray Firth fisheries task force (see Moray Firth Fisheries Action Group), involving the key fisheries organisations
  • events to explore and promote the potential for adding value to the Moray Firth fishery and the local economy
  • investigation of the potential to develop a more co-ordinated approach to the sustainable management of fisheries in the Firth
  • investigation of ways of tackling some of the conflict issues relating to fisheries in the Firth

This will be an important area of our work in the future, and is full of exciting opportunities to improve the current situation with the inshore fishery.

For more information please contact the MFP Manager

Tel. 01463 225530 e-mail: info@morayfirth-partnership.org
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